Stay true to the dreams of thy youth

• Netanyahu to offer withdrawal from 90% of West Bank - Ynetnews

  **Absolutely no offer of East Jerusalem, absurd. This probably is not true, but the fact that Netanyahu denies offering 90% of the West Bank while excluding East Jerusalem, demonstrates how firmly against any peaceful solution Netanyahu is.** "Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has prepared a "tempting" plan to be presented to the Palestinians in the direct negotiations, as part of which Israel will offer to withdraw from up to 90% of the West Bank, excluding east Jerusalem, the London-based Arabic-language al-Sharq al-Awsat newspaper reported Friday. The Prime Minister's Office denied the report, calling it "unfounded." "

• Cairo mosques begin unified call to prayer - Yahoo!

  "Is it even remotely feasible to get Cairo's 4,000 mosques to all sing the same tune? That's just what Egypt's government is aiming to do, beginning an ambitious project Thursday to unify the timing and sound of the Islamic call to prayer across the sprawling city of 18 million people, neighborhood by neighborhood. The project, which has been six years in the making, was meant to start in Cairo's northern suburbs on Wednesday, the first day of the holy fasting month of Ramadan, but system glitches and a communication breakdown delayed it by a day."

• Glenn Beck Is Indifferent to Gay Marriage - The Atlantic Wire

  "Glenn Beck is no stranger to quoting the founding fathers in an attempt to salvage a country that's "burning down." But, in an interview with Bill O'Reilly on Fox News, he invoked the words of Thomas Jefferson ("If it neither breaks my leg nor picks my pocket, what difference is it to me?") in support of an unlikely cause: gay marriage. Asked why he has remained notably silent on the recently overturned Proposition 8, he answered, "because honestly, I think we have bigger fish to fry." As O'Reilly pressed him to return to the gay marriage debate, Beck simply laughed off the idea and mocked the notion that gay-marriage was a "threat.""

• Netanyahu rejects peace talks based on 1967 borders - Haaretz

  "Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday rejected a Palestinian demand that direct negotiations be based on a statement by the Quartet confirming its position that the future Palestinian state will be based on the 1967 borders. Meeting in Jerusalem with U.S. envoy George Mitchell, Netanyahu repeated his demand for the renewal of direct talks without preconditions. Mitchell briefed Netanyahu on his meeting on Tuesday with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and gave the prime minister the Palestinian proposal. "

• Ground Zero Mosque Goes Green - The Daily Beast

  "In the midst of the drama around the mosque that’s being erected two blocks from Ground Zero, a few details have been left out that provide some clarity as to the purpose of this project. Specifically, the project will be the country’s first certified “green mosque,” in full compliance with stringent LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) standards, which is why organizers have named the project Park51, rather than the oft-cited “Cordoba House.”"

• The Lost Generation - The Washington Independent

  "In the report, the ILO warns of “significant consequences for young people as upcoming cohorts of new entrants join the ranks of the already unemployed” and of the “risk of a crisis legacy of a ‘lost generation’ comprised of young people who have dropped out of the labor market, having lost all hope of being able to work for a decent living.”"

• Iran-Israel-US: Goldberg Journalism “If You Build This War, It Will Come” - Enduring America

  "Let’s call this for what it is. Jeffrey Goldberg is not functioning as an analyst here. He is not even carrying out the fundamental task of a reporter. He is serving as a spokesman for the Israeli Government in its attempt to put psychological pressure on Iran, to block any resumption of talks on uranium enrichment, and possibly to push Washington into acceptance of, if not support for, Israel’s military action. Goldberg’s piece has no substance as a critique of the political, diplomatic, and military situation, for it is void of any information of — as opposed to rhetoric about — the state of Iran’s nuclear programme and its international strategy. It is void of any information about Washington’s perspective and approach, including the option — very much “on the table”, to use the cliche invoked for military action — of discussions with Tehran."

• Sorry, kid, first-borns really are smarter - Msnbc

  "Birth order within families has long sparked sibling rivalry, but it might also impact the child's personality and intelligence, a new study suggests. First-borns are typically smarter, while younger siblings get better grades and are more outgoing, the researchers say. "

• Tony Judt: An intellectual hero - Al Jazeera English

  "I only knew Judt in passing as a graduate student at NYU but his reputation was already secure then, as a leading historian of France and the European Left. What was as striking as his superior intellect was his equally clear intellectual courage. He was clearly an intellectual of both the 1960s and of the Left (a much maligned combination in Newt Gingrich's America). But unlike so many of his peers he grasped the inherent contradictions of both while they were happening. And so Judt became an astute and critical observer of why the era and its politics not only failed to bring about revolutionary change in Europe and the US, but produced a conservative backlash that is largely responsible for the slow destruction of the welfare states that had enabled unprecedented prosperity in the West in the decades after the second world war."

• IDF soldier on leave attacks group of Peace Now activists in Tel Aviv - Haaretz

  "An Israel Defense Forces soldier who was on leave attacked a group of left-wing activists from the Peace Now movement while they were passing out flyers in Tel Aviv on Friday. Tens of activists from Peace Now, which advocates a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, gathered at Tel Aviv's Arlozorov Train Station Friday morning and handed out stickers and flyers to people passing by. A soldier from the Israel Defense Force's Givati Bridade approached the group and began tearing down posters that the activists had put up. "

• Israel suffers from evoking Holocaust to justify militant policies - Haaretz

  "There are good and valid reasons for and against attacking Iran, but as long as the Holocaust is part of the equation, those who have to make the call will never be able to reach a reasoned decision. It seems that in the national Israeli psyche, backed up by the education system and the IDF, the only worthwhile lesson of the Holocaust is that Israel should be strong and defend itself, and the only purpose of defending Israel is that there should not be another Holocaust. "

• Israel prevents delivery of oxygen to hospitals

  "Seven oxygen machines donated to the Palestinain Authority by a Norwegian development agency were seized by Israeli officials en route to hospitals in the West Bank and Gaza, the Ramallah-based health ministry said. The machines, the ministry said in a Thursday statement, were confiscated by Israeli officials who claimed that the generators attached "came under the category of possible use for non-medical purposes" if they were delivered to the southern Gaza governorates. "

• Jesus did not die on cross, says scholar - Telegraph

  "The legend of his execution is based on the traditions of the Christian church and artistic illustrations rather than antique texts, according to theologian Gunnar Samuelsson. He claims the Bible has been misinterpreted as there are no explicit references the use of nails or to crucifixion - only that Jesus bore a "staurus" towards Calvary which is not necessarily a cross but can also mean a "pole". "

• Israeli FM: No Palestinian state by 2012 - Yahoo! News

  **surprise surprise** "Israel's hard-line foreign minister said Tuesday that there was "no chance" a Palestinian state would be established by 2012 — a message that threatened to cloud the latest visit by President Barack Obama's Mideast envoy. The comments by Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman drew swift Palestinian condemnations and could put Israel at odds with the international community, which has set a 2012 target for brokering a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians."

• Lebanon arrests 'Israeli spy' from mobile phone company - BBC
  

  "Lebanon has arrested a man accused of spying for Israel for more than 15 years, the country's Telecommunications Minister Charbel Nahhas has said. Mr Nahhas said the man was a technician with one of the country's two main mobile networks, and could have had access to sensitive information. Lebanon, which fought a war with Israel in 2006, has made a series of similar arrests in the last year, as part of an operation to dismantle spy networks."

• Inspectors find safety flaws where airline food is prepared - USATODAY.com

  ** I don't think I'll be eating airline food anymore** "Six months ago, Food and Drug Administration inspectors say, they found live roaches and dead roach carcasses "too numerous to count" inside the Denver facility of the world's largest airline caterer, LSG Sky Chefs. They also reported finding ants, flies and debris, and employees handling food with bare hands. Samples from a kitchen floor tested positive for Listeria, a bacteria that can cause serious and sometimes fatal infections in young children, the elderly and people with weakened immune systems. It's also dangerous to pregnant women."

• Fareed Zakaria - The fantasy of an Iranian revolution

  "I have been deeply supportive of Iran's Green Movement. I wrote about it, highlighted it on television and showcased its advocates. But I do not think it was likely to overthrow the Iranian regime. To believe that, one has to believe the government in Tehran is deeply unpopular with a majority of Iranians, holds onto power through military force alone and is thus vulnerable to a movement that could mobilize the vast majority in Iran who despise it. None of this is entirely true. "

• Op-Ed Contributor - Let Jordan Enrich Its Own Uranium - NYTimes

  "QUIETLY and with barely any public confrontation, Israel is creating a new enemy for itself: the Kingdom of Jordan. In the situation that we justifiably or unjustifiably find ourselves now — boycotted and isolated — we do not need to lose the only Arab state with which we have peace-like relations. "

• Questions for Tzipi Livni - Israel's Opposition Leader - Interview - NYTimes

  "Your parents were among the country’s founders. They were the first couple to marry in Israel, the very first. Both of them were in the Irgun. They were freedom fighters, and they met while boarding a British train. When the British Mandate was here, they robbed a train to get the money in order to buy weapons. It was a more romantic era."

• Fareed Zakaria - The fantasy of an Iranian revolution

  "I have been deeply supportive of Iran's Green Movement. I wrote about it, highlighted it on television and showcased its advocates. But I do not think it was likely to overthrow the Iranian regime. To believe that, one has to believe the government in Tehran is deeply unpopular with a majority of Iranians, holds onto power through military force alone and is thus vulnerable to a movement that could mobilize the vast majority in Iran who despise it. None of this is entirely true. "

  "Ironically, those hoping to liberate Iranians are the same people urging punitive sanctions and even military force against Iran. Do they think that when the bombs hit, those who wear green will be spared?"

• Jerusalem revives plan to raze Palestinian homes

  How sweet, Israel "consulted" with the Palestinian residents whose houses they are going to destroy to find how they can "better their lives." Perhaps, they should not destroy their homes, that would help. "A Jerusalem planning body on Monday approved a plan to raze 22 Palestinian homes in east Jerusalem to make room for an Israeli tourist center, a decision that could raise tensions in the divided city and deepen the conflict with the Obama adminstration. "Now, after fine-tuning the plan and seeking more cooperation with the residents as far as their needs and improving the quality of their lives, the municipality is ready to submit the plans for the first stage of approval," said Barkat's spokesman, Stephan Miller, before the city's planning commission agreed to the plan. "

• Rahm Emanuel expected to quit White House - Telegraph

  "Washington insiders say he will quit within six to eight months in frustration at their unwillingness to "bang heads together" to get policy pushed through. Mr Emanuel, 50, enjoys a good working relationship with Mr Obama but they are understood to have reached an understanding that differences over style mean he will serve only half the full four-year term. "

• Israel warns Lebanon aid ships - Al Jazeera English

  "A group of Lebanese women activists joined by Europeans and journalists are planning to sail for Gaza in the latest bid to break Israel's blockade of the coastal enclave." Just one more attempt to break the inhumane and injust blockade of Gaza. Momentum is building and Israel is on the wrong side of justice and history

• Poll: Most Palestinians want peace with Israel - Haaretz
  

  "Fafo, a Norwegian based international multidisciplinary research foundation, found that 73 percent of Palestinians in both the West Bank and Gaza were in favor of peace negotiations with Israel, but stressed that a settlement freeze should be a precondition to talks. The poll also revealed a rise in Palestinian support for halting rocket attacks from Gaza against Israel, rising from 53 percent in favor of a halt in 2009 to 61 percent in 2010. "

• Non-violence is not a principle, it is a tactic

  "“The point is that even if they were – while terribly difficult – the passengers could have resisted nonviolently by refusing to comply with the soldiers’ demands without making any attempt to injure them,” is ridiculous. When someone is shooting at you and your friends, you must disarm them, and probably use violence to do so. If you can’t disarm them, you must use violence to stop them from shooting, one way or another. The demand a bullet entering your skull makes on you is for you to die, and if there is a way to “refuse to comply” with that demand, Taylor and Nagler should fess up quick."

• In the Face of Overwhelming Odds - P U L S E

  "Which recent siege-busting ship was more visible, the Mavi Marmara or the Rachel Corrie? The unarmed activists on the Mavi Marmara quite correctly and lawfully resisted the piratical hijacking by Israeli forces in international waters. (Does anyone remember the heroes of United Airlines Flight 93?) On the Mavi Marmara, nine activists were murdered. Their sacrifice was not in vain – in the following days Israeli criminality was exposed as never before, and even the White House and Downing Street were enabled to make anti-siege noises. The passengers on the Rachel Corrie, on the other hand, announced in advance that they would not resist. As a result, only keen observers noticed the ship at all. (Readers of Ha’aretz may remember a photograph of a middle-aged European lady smiling as a gallant stormtrooper helped her disembark in Ashdod.) Unwittingly, the ‘non-violent’ activists (whose commitment I salute) handed Israel ammunition for its propaganda – ‘when civilised, peaceful activists arrive we deal with them peacefully. When mad Islamist Turks attack us with sticks, we have no choice but to shoot them many times at close range in the back of the head.’"

• Does Israel suffer from 'Iranophobia'? - CSMonitor.com

  "Menashri says the analogy is a mistake. “Because if Ahmadinejad is Hitler, if Nasser was Hitler, Saddam was Hitler, Arafat was Hitler – what can I tell my children about the unique character of the Holocaust? If I want to keep the memory, I am downgrading the historical significance of the Holocaust by repeating that every crazy thing is Hitler.”"

In today's news round up, voices in both the Western press and Israel are questioning Netanyahu's strategy of intentionally blowing of the Obama Administration with the alleged goal of keeping his coalition intact (and continuing his goal of ethnically cleansing Palestinians from any future Palestinian state). The Wall Street Journal publishes an idiotic opinion piece by a simplistic tool, who alleges that Arabs "hate" the United States because of Lady Gaga, not because of our failure to stop Israeli settlements. The international community continues to find alleged evidence of Iranian attempts to develop nuclear weapons.

• FT.com / Comment / Opinion - A deaf and defiant Israel is gambling with its future

  "Yet Israel’s claim upon East Jerusalem is rooted in a sense of moral entitlement, which the rest of the world increasingly rejects. Some day Americans will awaken to the heavy strategic price their own nation pays for indulging Israeli excesses. Israel may be successful in securing all of Jerusalem within its own borders. But it runs the historic risk of making itself, by a ghastly irony, a pariah state."

• Destruction of Gazan cheese factory continues pattern Goldstone found illegal

  "The targeting of the means of sustenance for the civilian population in Gaza is an area that Judge Richard Goldstone focused on in his United Nations report on the Israeli assault on Gaza. I assume the crude logic behind the targeting of a cheese and dairy factory in the heart of Gaza is part of putting “Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger,” as Dov Weisglass, an adviser to former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, said, in explaining the suffocating blockade that has been imposed on the Gaza Strip."

• Lady Gaga vs. the Occupation - By Thomas Hegghammer | Foreign Policy

  "In recent weeks, U.S. Gen. David Petraeus and others have made headlines by suggesting that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict increases anti-Americanism in the Muslim world. The Wall Street Journal's Bret Stephens takes issue with this claim, arguing that cultural Westernization -- in the form of Lady Gaga and other imports that scandalize Muslim conservatives -- is a more important cause of anti-Americanism in the Muslim world than the Palestinian conflict. Stephens notes that Islamists resented American culture well before the Palestinian issue became prominent. As key evidence, he cites Muslim Brotherhood ideologue Sayyid Qutb's rants on American culture following the latter's stay in the United States in the late 1940s. "

• Wine Makers in California's Anderson Valley Battle Smoke Taste - WSJ.com

  "PHILO, Calif.—In wine vernacular, "smoky bacon" is a prized flavor for pinot noir. Not so is "wet ashtray," which is where the powdered sturgeon bladders come in. The 2008 pinot noirs from here in California's Anderson Valley are starting to show up in stores. But severe forest fires during the growing season hit the grape crop that year. The fires left much of the resulting wine with "smoke taint," according to many local winemakers, a condition similar to that in a "corked" bottle in which one unwanted taste overwhelms everything else."

• Iran Nuclear Ring Probed - WSJ.com

  "An Iranian firm closely linked to Tehran's nuclear program acquired special hardware for enriching uranium, despite sanctions intended to keep such equipment out of Iran, according to officials with knowledge of the matter. In recent weeks, the officials said, an Iranian procurement firm obtained critical valves and vacuum gauges made by a French company that until December was owned by U.S. industrial conglomerate Tyco International. The French and U.S. firms said they knew nothing of the case."

• Report: Iranian nuclear scientist defects to U.S. - Haaretz - Israel News

• Protests mushroom countrywide | Al-Masry Al-Youm: Today's News from Egypt

  "Scores of people demonstrating before Egypt's parliament building in downtown Cairo on Tuesday--for a host of different reasons--threatened to step up protests if their parliamentary representatives failed to address their demands. In recent days, the sidewalk opposite the parliament building has become the site of six independent demonstrations."

A few thoughts for the day:

First, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia's take on the health care debate.

News to read:

• Jewish politicians are taking Jerusalem's name in vain - Haaretz - Israel News

  Israeli politicians doing there best to talk about an undivided Jerusalem, while screwing over the Arab residents

• PepsiCo Develops 'Designer Salt' to Chip Away at Sodium Intake - WSJ.com

  odd

• SPIEGEL Interview with Avigdor Lieberman: 'It Is a Clash of Civilizations' - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International

  Interview with a true religious terrorist

• Report: Netanyahu to ask Obama for weapons to strike Iran - Haaretz - Israel News

• James Baker's advice for Obama on forging Middle East peace - Haaretz - Israel News

Oh, and the House finally passed the health care bill!

Here's a look at some of today's news:

1. US Secretary of State Clinton has given Netanyahu a list of demands which must be satisfied to restore "strained" US-Israeli relations.

She also called for an official Israeli declaration that talks with the Palestinians will deal with all of the conflict's core issues, including borders, the status of Jerusalem, refugees, and settlements, the paper reported.

Clinton had earlier told Netanyahu that his government was putting US ties at risk by failing to take action towards renewed Middle East peace talks.

2. Opposition leaders in Egypt are demanding that the next grand sheikh of Al-Azhar be voted on by a group of scholars. The spot was vacated last week with the death of the late Grand Sheikh Tantawi, 81.

Opposition leader Ayman Nour wrote in the daily al-Dostour: “May God have mercy on Sheikh Tantawi for his religious knowledge, and forgive him for working in politics.

“We hope that a respected scholar would come to lead al-Azhar, modernize its role and regain its status,” added Nour.

3. A coalition of business groups led by the US Chamber of Commerce has spent over $11 million this month alone (and could reach $30 million) on advertising targeting certain Democrats, pressuring them to vote against health care legislation.

Not only are these swing Democrats being pummeled in the new spate of advertising — which could total $30 million before week’s end — but extensive efforts are under way in Congressional districts, where groups on both sides of the issue are using tactics similar to get-out-the-vote drives to urge constituents to contact their lawmakers. Mr. Obama is calling lawmakers, too, and on Monday is traveling to Ohio to open a weeklong campaign to close this act of the health care debate

4. Panic in the country of Georgia as a news channel broadcast a fake report claiming the Russians were invading the state. Resulting in a public reaction similar to that of Orson Welles' War of the Worlds, citizens rushed to the supermarkets, called loved ones on their cellphones (crashing the network), and some had heart pains.

Looking nervous and fumbling with papers as if juggling the chaos of a breaking news story, the anchor announced that sporadic fighting had begun on the streets of Tbilisi, the capital, that Russian bombers were airborne and heading for Georgia, that troops were skirmishing to the west and that a tank battalion was reported to be on the move.

The broadcast showed tanks rumbling down a road, billowing exhaust, along with jerky images of a fighter jet racing out of the sky and dropping bombs.

5. Some people are asking why the ultra-conservative commentator Glenn Beck hates Jesus, after he recently said on his show that Christians should leave their churches if there is any talk of "social justice."

When Glenn Beck told listeners of his radio show on March 2 that they should "run as fast as you can" from any church that preached "social or economic justice" because those were code words for Communism and Nazism, he probably thought he was tweaking a few crunchy religious liberals who didn't listen to the show anyway...

6. Just as the US contemplated bombing China in the 1960s to prevent it from getting the bomb, conservative commentators are still calling for an attack on Iran citing their alleged irrationality and suicidal ambitions. However, should Iran get the bomb, containment works.

So what is the argument for containment? Basically, it assumes that if China and Russia changed over decades, so might Iran. And nuclear weapons can handcuff a nation as easily as they can empower it. Last week, at the University of Oklahoma, Mr. Brzezinski argued that either an Iranian bomb or an attack on Iran would be “a calamity, a disaster.” He said containment could work because Iran “may be dangerous, assertive and duplicitous, but there is nothing in their history to suggest they are suicidal.”

Great article by Sharmine Narwani at The Huffington Post on Israel beating the drums of war one country at a time. There have been rumors floating around for quite awhile that another attack on Lebanon will take place shortly.

The link can be found here.

So instead of self-examination, Israel's conflicted, and increasingly right-wing political body unleashed a belligerent tone -- angry, defiant, threatening, unfocused like a petulant and wounded child. Diversionary tactics came into play to focus domestic and international attention elsewhere and fill the frustrating void -- Hamas in Gaza, the potential nuclear aspirations of Iran, Palestinian intransigence on peace talks, Hezbollah's weapons, Syria, Turkey, anti-Semitism, the Goldstone Report.

A few more articles worth reading today:

1. Mississippi is turning to Iran for advice and assistance in improving its rural health care. The project is forging unlikely alliances between this community and Iran.

2. The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood finished its latest round of democratic elections for the Brotherhood's Shura Council.

3. Christmas rock concert in Bethlehem.

It is true that the European Union leaders who came to occupied Jerusalem last January to publicly embrace Ehud Olmert, the then Israeli prime minister, - while white phosphorus seared the flesh of Gazan children and bodies lay under the rubble - still cower before their respective Israel lobbies, as do American and Canadian politicians.

But the shift in public opinion is palpable as Israel's own actions transform it into a pariah whose driving forces are not the liberal democratic values with which it claims to identify, but ultra-nationalism, racism, religious fanaticism, settler-colonialism and a Jewish supremacist order maintained by frequent massacres.

Below are some recent articles discussing the continued siege of Gaza and the intentional Israeli policy of utterly destroying the lives of those who live in the Strip. One of the most direct quotes started this article.

Israel Resembles a Failed State, Al-Jazeera

Punish, Humiliate, Terrorise, Al-Jazeera

Tough military stance stirs little debate in Israel, NYT

I am hanging out in New York currently, hitting up some museums, meeting endless amounts of Swedes and Brazilians at the hostel and enjoying some greenery and fairly decent weather. I'll be heading down to DC later this afternoon.

Below is a copy of US House Resolution 867 to be introduced this week in the US Congress. If you didn't think Congress was in AIPAC's pocket already, enjoy this piece of legislation. As an indication of how extreme it is, even the moderate/semi-right wing J Street organization is against this resolution. I've added comments after the parts I find particularly obnoxious.

111th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. RES. 867

Calling on the President and the Secretary of State to oppose
unequivocally any endorsement or further consideration of the `Report
of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict’ in
multilateral fora.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

October 23, 2009

Ms. ROS-LEHTINEN (for herself, Mr. BERMAN, Mr. BURTON of Indiana, and
Mr. ACKERMAN) submitted the following resolution; which was referred
to the Committee on Foreign Affairs
________________________________

RESOLUTION
Calling on the President and the Secretary of State to oppose
unequivocally any endorsement or further consideration of the `Report
of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict’ in
multilateral fora.
Whereas, on January 12, 2009, the United Nations Human Rights Council
passed Resolution A/HRC/S-9/L.1, which authorized a `fact-finding
mission’ regarding Israel’s conduct of Operation Cast Lead against
violent militants in the Gaza Strip between December 27, 2008, and
January 18, 2009;
Whereas the resolution pre-judged the outcome of its investigation, by
one-sidedly mandating the `fact-finding mission’ to `investigate all
violations of international human rights law and International
Humanitarian Law by . . . Israel, against the Palestinian people . . .
particularly in the occupied Gaza Strip, due to the current
aggression’; ***Israel refused to let the fact-finding mission into the country, therefore setting themselves up for the allegations. Somehow Goldstone, a respected Jewish jurist is a self-hating Jew who is also inherently anti-Semitic based on his leanings toward peace*

Whereas the mandate of the `fact-finding mission’ makes no mention of
the relentless rocket and mortar attacks, which numbered in the
thousands and spanned a period of eight years, by Hamas and other
violent militant groups in Gaza against civilian targets in Israel,
that necessitated Israel’s defensive measures; ***Nevermind that Gaza rocket attacks have killed only a few people, while one massacre in Gaza killed 1,400. That is not defense.***

Whereas the `fact-finding mission’ included a member who, before
joining the mission, had already declared Israel guilty of committing
atrocities in Operation Cast Lead by signing a public letter on
January 11, 2009, published in the Sunday Times, that called Israel’s
actions `war crimes’;
Whereas the mission’s flawed and biased mandate gave serious concern
to many United Nations Human Rights Council Member States which
refused to support it, including Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cameroon,
Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, the Republic
of Korea, Slovakia, Slovenia, Switzerland, Ukraine, and the United
Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland;
Whereas the mission’s flawed and biased mandate troubled many
distinguished individuals who refused invitations to head the mission;
Whereas, on September 15, 2009, the `United Nations Fact Finding
Mission on the Gaza Conflict’ released its report;

Whereas the report repeatedly made sweeping and unsubstantiated
determinations that the Israeli military had deliberately attacked
civilians during Operation Cast Lead;
Whereas the authors of the report, in the body of the report itself,
admit that `we did not deal with the issues . . . regarding the
problems of conducting military operations in civilian areas and
second-guessing decisions made by soldiers and their commanding
officers `in the fog of war.’;
Whereas in the October 16th edition of the Jewish Daily Forward,
Richard Goldstone, the head of the `United Nations Fact Finding
Mission on the Gaza Conflict’, is quoted as saying, with respect to
the mission’s evidence-collection methods, `If this was a court of
law, there would have been nothing proven.’;
Whereas the report, in effect, denied the State of Israel the right to
self-defense, and never noted the fact that Israel had the right to
defend its citizens from the repeated violent attacks committed
against civilian targets in southern Israel by Hamas and other Foreign
Terrorist Organizations operating from Gaza; ***No matter that Palestinians apparently have no right to defend themselves from economic blockades, daily incursions, targeted assassinations and kidnappings***

Whereas the report largely ignored the culpability of the Government
of Iran and the Government of Syria, both of whom sponsor Hamas and
other Foreign Terrorist Organizations; ***I hear the AIPAC/Republican Party war drums in the background...***

Whereas the report usually considered public statements made by
Israeli officials not to be credible, while frequently giving
uncritical credence to statements taken from what it called the `Gaza
authorities’, i.e. the Gaza leadership of Hamas;
Whereas, notwithstanding a great body of evidence that Hamas and other
violent Islamist groups committed war crimes by using civilians and
civilian institutions, such as mosques, schools, and hospitals, as
shields, the report repeatedly downplayed or cast doubt upon that
claim;
Whereas in one notable instance, the report stated that it did not
consider the admission of a Hamas official that Hamas often `created a
human shield of women, children, the elderly and the mujahideen,
against [the Israeli military]‘ specifically to `constitute evidence
that Hamas forced Palestinian civilians to shield military objectives
against attack.’;
Whereas Hamas was able to significantly shape the findings of the
investigation mission’s report by selecting and prescreening some of
the witnesses and intimidating others, as the report acknowledges when
it notes that `those interviewed in Gaza appeared reluctant to speak
about the presence of or conduct of hostilities by the Palestinian
armed groups . . . from a fear of reprisals’;
Whereas even though Israel is a vibrant democracy with a vigorous and
free press, the report of the `fact-finding mission’ erroneously
asserts that `actions of the Israeli government . . . have contributed
significantly to a political climate in which dissent with the
government and its actions . . . is not tolerated’; ***Democracy if you are Jewish, not if you are in occupied territory. Also, a "free press" that decided to not let any reporters into Gaza during the war, who kidnapped and imprisoned Vananu for revealing Israel's nuclear program, who has killed dozens of foreign reporters and peace activists...***

Whereas the report recommended that the United Nations Human Rights
Council endorse its recommendations, implement them, review their
implementation, and refer the report to the United Nations Security
Council, the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, and the
United Nations General Assembly for further action;
Whereas the report recommended that the United Nations Security Council–
(1) require the Government of Israel to launch further investigations
of its conduct during Operation Cast Lead and report back to the
Security Council within six months;
(2) simultaneously appoint an `independent committee of experts’ to
monitor and report on any domestic legal or other proceedings
undertaken by the Government of Israel within that six-month period;
and
(3) refer the case to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal
Court after that six-month period;
Whereas the report recommended that the United Nations General
Assembly consider further action on the report and establish an escrow
fund, to be funded entirely by the State of Israel, to `pay adequate
compensation to Palestinians who have suffered loss and damage’ during
Operation Cast Lead;
Whereas the report ignored the issue of compensation to Israelis who
have been killed or wounded, or suffered other loss and damage, as a
result of years of past and continuing rocket and mortar attacks by
Hamas and other violent militant groups in Gaza against civilian
targets in southern Israel; *** So paying Palestinian victims is to be condemned, but Palestinians should compensate those who stole their land in the first place and put them into cages?***

Whereas the report recommended `that States Parties to the Geneva
Conventions of 1949 start criminal investigations [of Operation Cast
Lead] in national courts, using universal jurisdiction’ and that
`following investigation, alleged perpetrators should be arrested and
prosecuted’;
Whereas the concept of `universal jurisdiction’ has frequently been
used in attempts to detain, charge, and prosecute Israeli and United
States officials and former officials in connection with unfounded
allegations of war crimes and has often unfairly impeded the travel of
those individuals;
Whereas the State of Israel, like many other free democracies, has an
independent judicial system with a robust investigatory capacity and
has already launched numerous investigations, many of which remain
ongoing, of Operation Cast Lead and individual incidents therein;
Whereas Libya and others have indicated that they intend to further
pursue consideration of the report and implementation of its
recommendations by the United Nations Security Council, the United
Nations General Assembly, the United Nations Human Rights Council, and
other multilateral fora;
Whereas the President instructed the United States Mission to the
United Nations and other international organizations in Geneva to vote
against resolution A-HRC-S-12-1, which endorsed the report and
condemned Israel, at the special session of the Human Rights Council
held on October 15-16, 2009;
Whereas, on September 30, 2009, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
described the mandate for the report as `one-sided’;
Whereas, on September 17, 2009, Ambassador Susan Rice, United States
Permanent Representative to the United Nations, expressed the United
States’ `very serious concern with the mandate’ and noted that the
United States views the mandate `as unbalanced, one-sided and
basically unacceptable’;
Whereas the `Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the
Gaza Conflict’ reflects the longstanding, historic bias at the United
Nations against the democratic, Jewish State of Israel; ***Don’t worry about those non-Jewish citizens, they aren’t important***

Whereas the `Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the
Gaza Conflict’ is being exploited by Israel’s enemies to excuse the
actions of violent militant groups and their state sponsors, and to
justify isolation of and punitive measures against the democratic,
Jewish State of Israel; ***Rather the report is being used by Israel to excuse its own violent actions in Gaza which killed 700 civilians or more by claiming anti-Semitism in everything that moves***
Whereas, on October 16, 2009, the United Nations Human Rights Council
voted 25-6 (with 11 states abstaining and 5 not voting) to adopt
resolution A-HRC-S-12-1, which endorsed the `Report of the United
Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict’ and condemned
Israel, without mentioning Hamas, other such violent militant groups,
or their state sponsors; and
Whereas efforts to delegitimize the democratic State of Israel and
deny it the right to defend its citizens and its existence can be used
to delegitimize other democracies and deny them the same right: Now,
therefore, be it
Resolved, That the House of Representatives–
(1) considers the `Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission
on the Gaza Conflict’ to be irredeemably biased and unworthy of
further consideration or legitimacy;
(2) supports the Administration’s efforts to combat anti-Israel bias
at the United Nations, its characterization of the `Report of the
United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict’ as
`unbalanced, one-sided and basically unacceptable’, and its opposition
to the resolution on the report;
(3) calls on the President and the Secretary of State to continue to
strongly and unequivocally oppose any endorsement of the `Report of
the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict’ in
multilateral fora;
(4) calls on the President and the Secretary of State to strongly and
unequivocally oppose any further consideration of the `Report of the
United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict’ and any
other measures stemming from this report in multilateral fora; and
(5) reaffirms its support for the democratic, Jewish State of Israel,
for Israel’s security and right to self-defense, and, specifically,
for Israel’s right to defend its citizens from violent militant groups
and their state sponsors. *** but of course, Palestinians can’t defend themselves from violent and militant state sponsors, known as the IDF. Sounds vaguely familiar to nationalist fighters in Algeria and Egypt who fought against their colonial occupiers and were called called terrorists, or to charges leveled against Nelson Mandela... odd.***

Below are a number of sources that I compiled this week asI found them thought-provoking, interesting, alarming or just downright scary (see video).

John Mueller, a professor of political science at Ohio State University published a piece entitled "The Rise of Nuclear Alarmism" in Foreign Policy. His thesis:

The only real effect of nuclear weapons is humanity's unhealthy obsession with them, a preoccupation that has inspired some seriously bad policy decisions.

While I am certainly not an expert on anything nuclear related, he makes some convincing (and some not too convincing) arguments about the hysteria surrounding nuclear weapons. In an apt comparison, he mentions the hysteria in the 1960s when China was acquiring nuclear weapons, and the United States believed China would use the bomb to blackmail its enemies. Rather, China acquired the bomb, and kept it quietly hidden away, much as the US and Soviet Union had done (with a few exceptions). He does not make the exact comparison, but I think this will apply to Iran as well should it acquire the bomb.

The article can be found here.

The second article is a blog post from Al Jazeera correspondent Jacky Rowland. Writing in a very personal style, she examines continued Israeli efforts to change the demographic makeup of East Jerusalem by driving out Palestinians, demolishing their homes and destroying their very way of life. The post can be found here.

The third article, also addressing US political options with Iran is an article by the eminent political scientist Steve Walt. In this article, he examines the arguments made by neocon Eliot Cohen, who says the only choice in Iran is this: either Israel bombs Iran or the United States does. The second op-ed examined comes from the NYT and is written by Flynt and Hillary Mann Leverett. This op-ed calls for robust diplomatic options with Iran, as everyone knows the military option will not work with Iran. Overall, an interesting analysis. It can be found here.

Finally, a rather frightening piece found on YouTube, courtesy of my Arabic professor. It is a six second clip of a Star Trek episode, with a guest appearance by a certain Middle East figure. I won't tell you who it is, but I'll give you a hint (He is currently king of Jordan). Enjoy.

Below is a great op-ed by Roger Cohen of the NYT.

The original link can be found here.

New York - Is Israel just a nation among nations?

On one level, it is indeed an ordinary place. People curse the traffic, follow their stocks, Blackberry, go to the beach and pay their mortgages. Stroll around in the prosperous North Tel Aviv suburbs and you find yourself California dreaming.

On another, it’s not. More than 60 years after the creation of the modern state, Israel has no established borders, no constitution, no peace. Born from exceptional horror, the Holocaust, it has found normality elusive.

The anxiety of the diaspora Jews has ceded not to tranquility but to another anxiety. The escape from walls has birthed new walls. The annihilation psychosis has not disappeared but taken new form.

For all Israel’s successes — it is the most open, creative and dynamic society in the region — this is a gnawing failure. Can anything be done about it?

Perhaps a good place to start that inquiry is by noting that Israel does not see itself as normal. Rather it lives in a perpetual state of exceptionalism.

I understand this: Israel is a small country whose neighbors are enemies or cold bystanders. But I worry when Israel makes a fetish of its exceptional status. It needs to deal with the world as it is, however discomfiting, not the world of yesterday.

The Holocaust represented a quintessence of evil. But it happened 65 years ago. Its perpetrators are dead or dying. A Holocaust prism may be distorting. History illuminates — and blinds.

These reflections stirred on reviewing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to the U.N. last month. The first 30 paragraphs were devoted to an inflammatory conflation of Nazi Germany (the word “Nazi” appears five times), modern Iran, Al Qaeda (a Sunni ideology foreign to Shiite Iran) and global terrorism, with lonely and exceptional Israel standing up against them all.

Here’s Netanyahu’s summary of the struggle of our age: “It pits civilization against barbarism, the 21st century against the 9th century, those who sanctify life against those who glorify death.”

That’s facile, resonant — and unhelpful. Sure, it’s an outlook that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s unacceptable Holocaust denial and threats comfort. (Several Iranian leaders have also spoken of accepting any deal on Israel that the Palestinians agree to.)

There’s another way of looking at the ongoing struggle in the Middle East — less dramatic and more accurate.

That is to see it as a fight for a different balance of power — and possibly greater stability — between a nuclear-armed Israel (an estimated 80 to 200 never-acknowledged weapons), a proud but uneasy Iran and an increasingly sophisticated and aware (if repressed) Arab world.

Some of Israel’s enemies contest its very existence, however powerless they are to end it. But the death-cult terrorists-versus-reasonable-Israelis paradigm falls short. There are various civilizations in the Middle East, whose attitudes toward religion and modernism vary, but who all quest for some accommodation between them.

One casualty of this view, of course, is Israeli exceptionalism. The Jewish state becomes more like any other nation fighting for influence and treasure. I think President Obama, himself talking down American exceptionalism, is trying to nudge Israel toward a more prosaic, realistic self-image.

Hence the U.S. abstention last month at a U.N. nuclear assembly vote calling on all states in the Middle East to “accede to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear weapons” (N.P.T.) and create a nuclear-weapon-free Middle East — an idea Obama administration officials have supported in line with a nuclear disarmament agenda.

A shift is perceptible in the decades-old tacit American endorsement of Israel’s undeclared nuclear arsenal. This is logical. To deal effectively with the nuclear program of Iran, an N.P.T. member, while ignoring the nuclear status of non-N.P.T. Israel is to invite accusations of double standards. President Obama doesn’t like them.

I’d say there’s a tenable case for Israel ending its nuclear exceptionalism, coming clean on its arsenal and joining the N.P.T. as part of any U.S.-endorsed regional security arrangement that stops Iran short of weaponization.

It’s also worth noting the sensible tone of Defense Secretary Robert Gates — in flagrant contrast to Netanyahu. “The only way you end up not having a nuclear capable Iran is for the Iranian government to decide that their security is diminished by having those weapons as opposed to strengthened,” Gates says.

In other words, as I’ve long argued, Iran makes rational decisions. Rather than invoking the Holocaust — a distraction — Israel should view Iran coolly, understand the hesitancy of Tehran’s nuclear brinksmanship, and see how it can gain from U.S.-led diplomacy.

Cut the posturing and deal with reality. This can be painful — as with Justice Richard Goldstone’s recent U.N. report finding that both Israeli forces and Palestinian militants committed possible crimes against humanity during Israel’s military operations in Gaza.

But it’s also instructive. Goldstone is a measured man — I’ve known him a long time. The Israeli response to his findings strikes me as an example of the blinding effect of exceptionalism unbound. Ordinary nations have failings.

The Middle East has changed. So must Israel. “Never again” is a necessary but altogether inadequate way of dealing with the modern world.

Two recent articles caught my eye. I thought I would share.

The first: Christian leaders praying for the death of President Obama

Christian Hate: Three Nationally Recognized Pastors Praying for Obama's Death
October 3, 2009

"Israel can determine for itself — it’s a sovereign nation — what’s in their interest and what they decide to do relative to Iran and anyone else," - VP Biden

If you truly want to support the hardliners in Iran, and give Ahmadinejad all the excuses he needs to stay in power, do what Vice-President Biden did today - give Israel the green light to bomb Iran. With US objections out of the way, Netanyahu will have the ability to attack Iran and to scuttle any peace prospects between Israel-Syria and Israel-Palestine - all in one fell swoop. Two birds with one stone, so to speak. Netanyahu has made abundantly clear that he has no desire to actually seek a resolution to the continued occupation of Palestine. Israel is doing just fine having all the military power, all the economic power and the support of the world's sole superpower.

By bombing Iran and its various nuclear facilities, Netanyahu will partially set back the unsubstantiated nuclear ambitions of Iran, at least for a short time. He will also effectively destroy any chance of Syria and Israel reaching agreement on the Golan Heights, which gets closer every month. In addition to scuttling any chance of further peace talks with the Palestinians or Arab countries in general.

Unfortunately, it is the long-term consequences which Israel has never been any good at foreseeing (See Israeli invasion of Lebanon and the creation of Hizbollah, as well as Israeli support for Hamas to counter the PLO). Bombing Iran's nuclear facilities will only reaffirm the opinions of the hardliners in Iran, that Israel really is their mortal enemy, and that only with nuclear weapons will Iran have an effective deterrent against arbitrary Israeli attacks on their sovereign territory. Any Israeli attacks will also cause a rally-around-the-flag effect, as seen in the US after 9/11, where all discourse except the hegemonic and jingoistic views of the hard line regime will be pushed to the margins.

Essentially, if Israel bombs Iran, all liberal politicians and dissenters will be silenced. This will leave the regime with greater room to maneuver, as well as with a greater drive to arm Hizbollah, Hamas and any other group capable of striking at Israel - resulting in a less secure Israel in the long run.

See the article on Biden's interview here.